is an adventure featuring the culinary antics of Flint Malone, a Cajun caterer from New Iberia, Louisiana. Flint’s expertise around a stove is only outdone by his investigation of mysterious events surrounding Hammer University, an automotive college teaching non-confrontational sales and communication techniques. Flint’s former boss, Jim, asks his help to investigate suspected industrial espionage threatening Hammer University. Using his catering business called
Flint and his assistant Lila become embroiled in several murders obviously interwoven in a satanic cult on Galveston Island in which several Hammer University employees are deeply involved. The adventure brings Flint to his hometown of New Iberia, Louisiana, where to his horror he discovers that the core of the cult’s origin is right at his back door. No obvious clues tie the intricate web of intrigue together until Flint discovers an insidious disposal system for body parts. Flint transforms himself into a unique old reprobate named Gator, the disguise allowing Flint to infiltrate the cult and expose its evil and prosecute the central members. In
good prevails over evil and the reader becomes deeply involved in the characters, their foibles, and sensual innuendoes. An interesting and useful aside to this adventure is a number of descriptive recipes for some of Flint’s favorite Cajun delicacies, the reader can follow and prepare while joining Flint and Company in a spiritual and actual battle that will literally keep you glued to either your stove or your chair.
I returned to Belmont rather than Boo’s being careful that I wasn’t followed. I called Boo from my cell phone informing him of my decision. He agreed to meet me after dark and bring my Riviera to swap with his old truck. I also called Merry to forewarn her of Gator’s impending visit so she wouldn’t freak out at my decrepit appearance and accented crooked smile from the fake scar. Wouldn’t want to scare the poor girl into the golleywoggles.
Having warned her that I was coming, I approached the back door and knocked as an additional precaution. She let me in but had to look twice to make sure it was I. "I’ll swear you could fool me even knowing it was you!" she exclaimed as I walked in and made myself a stiff scotch and water. "You look positively fierce!" Some homemade vegetable soup was bubbling on the stove and it would be most welcome on this rainy night.
After a supper of the magnificent soup and French bread, I removed my makeup and the accouterment of my disguise, poured another highball and sat on the back porch enjoying Merry’s company as we waited for Boo to swap vehicles with me. Just before eight o’clock he arrived and jogged up the back walk to the back porch.
"Evening, Miss Merry!" he sang out as he mounted the steps. "One wet day and evening, ain’t it? Flint, how’d your visit to Bon T-Boy’s go?"
I related my story after Merry excused herself to make a few phone calls for her church work. Her little Episcopal Church was searching for a new Rector and she was on the Search Committee. Boo chuckled at the details of the story, especially Man Mountain sitting on the floor in complete obedience. He was probably still sitting there so thoroughly had Old Gator bamboozled the poor dimwit.
Buzz ambled over to join us for a short visit, as was our family tradition. He fixed himself a bourbon and water and another for Boo as we planned the next evening’s excursion. The weather report was predicting the rain to end during the afternoon of the next day. That would be perfect. The rain during the morning would allow some harvesting of hyacinths to weave into the stealth boat’s webbing. We’d meet at Sheriff Breaux’s fishing camp on the canal between the Teche and Lake Dauterive. Boo and Buzz would then arm themselves and slowly propel themselves toward the target of our attention.
"What’re you boys going to do ‘bout them gators?" I asked in as calm a fashion as possible. "Better bring along a persuader or something," I suggested.
"Got that all figured," said Boo. "The chicken cocktails are marinating as we speak. I’ve shot up a dozen and a half fresh chicken carcasses with enough barbiturates to dull a dinosaur. Two months ago we raided an eighteen-wheeler on Highway 90 just outside of town and busted a huge drug ring that had been plaguing us for months. There was enough seconal in that load to put half of New Orleans asleep for months. I imagine it’ll work just as well on a few old gators."
"Sounds like a plan to me, "I said. "Just make sure you have all your fingers left when you hand-feed those old boys while you’re under that wharf. Maybe you’d better bring along a pole with a hook in it or something."
"Got that all planned, too," retorted Boo. "Sheriff Breaux’s been thinking about this stuff for some time now. There’s probably not a stone he’s left unturned. But, that’s why I’m here anyway. Buzz, you got any questions?"
Being a man of few words, Buzz just scratched his day old beard that was about three shades darker that the blackest night God ever made. He usually shaves three times a day when he’s teaching because his beard grows so fast.
"Not really, Mr. Worthy. You just tell me what you want me to do and I’ll do it. What weapons do you want me to bring? I have quite a few." Buzz had a small armory in the old cottage his mom had converted into a home for herself and the three children with whom she returned after her husband died an untimely death in Alabama many years prior.
"Bring just short arms. I’ll bring some riot guns from the office. We’ll use double ought buckshot and slugs in the twelve gauges. I’ll have my .40 caliber Glok and the nine-millimeter backup. Just bring whatever suits you." Buzz allowed that he’d bring his .44 magnum and the .38 Smith and Wesson Chief Special as his back up. Sounded like they’d be ready to me. We set the time to meet at four o’clock the next afternoon. Boo’d bring Sharon to finalize my Gator disguise and we’d be set for action. Sheriff Breaux would have all the "proof" I’d need at that time regarding the 20-footer lying on the bayou bank sunning after his game warden meal.
Just as the weatherman had promised, the rain stopped about mid-afternoon. Rather than clear up and become beautiful as one might expect after such a storm blew through, the weather remained cloudy and dreary with a heavy ground fog forming as it embraced the low-lying bogs and borrow pits that lined the road to Lake Dauterive and the gravel road leading to Sheriff Breaux’s camp.
Breaux’s camp was more like a log mansion. Fashioned out of Louisiana white cypress logs, the camp was a two-story home with all bedrooms upstairs. The entire downstairs was living area supporting the second story on cypress tree stumps rooted in the floor’s planking made of Tupelo Poplar. Each trunk was festooned with mounted trophy bass and waterfowl of numerous descriptions, bobcats, squirrels and a rare white nutria. Fish netting hung from the ceiling in places, and old pictures adorned the chinked walls. The whole place looked like it should have been a movie set. The back porch overlooked the hyacinth-clogged canal leading to Lake Dauterive.
Standing on the back porch, Sheriff Breaux pointed to the canal and said, "Well fellas, there she is!"
"There who is?" we asked in unison seeing nothing but a sea of green from which sprung an occasional lavender bloom or two.
"Follow me," he instructed. We walked down the steps to a large clump of water hyacinths bobbing innocently in the swollen stream. Woven through the front of the clump was a huge cottonmouth.
"Holy S---!" yelled Buzz as he drew his .44 and took aim at the huge snake.
"Halt!" shouted the Sheriff as he clamped down on Buzz’s arm. "It’s not alive. Just thought it’d make for a realistic little barge for you guys to float around on tonight."
He walked up to the edge of the bank and stuck his arm down into the hyacinths dangerously close to the dead snake’s head. Slowly he lifted the webbing to reveal a fourteen-foot Johnboat beneath the framework and vegetation festooned webbing. The boat was just wide enough for two men to lie side by side. The motor was carefully hidden and wired to three boat batteries in the very rear of the craft. The seats had been boarded over with plywood and then covered with padding to make the ride a bit more comfortable. Lying down, the hyacinth cover allowed them to see forward through the leaves and blossoms, right over the dead snake’s back so they could guide their stealthy craft slowly beneath the wharf on which sat Bon T-Boy’s den of iniquity.
"Flint, how are you going to pull this off without getting yourself shot?" Sheriff Breaux asked.
"T’ain’t but one way to get in there, Sir. Walk right in and set right down. Gator’s going to blow your mind!" I sang to the tune of the sixties rock and roll song. "Just gotta call their bluff. Walk in like I did yesterday, just like I owned the joint. Walk in and shove that picture you have for me right in his face and then start talking. I just hope I can get into that back room and see what’s going on."
"This sounds just too simple, Flint," said Sheriff Breaux dubiously.
"There’s gotta be a catch to getting into that back room." As he was speaking, my dark side kicked in. My mind thought ‘there’s gotta be something missing here that we could see if we’d just look.’
"I trust you have a search warrant that is absolutely comprehensive from a judge with impeccable credentials we can trust unequivocally?" I asked with due hesitation because this wasn’t my bailiwick. I didn’t want anyone to think I was second-guessing the legal system, however it was my butt on the line tonight, as well as Boo’s and Buzz’s. If anything happened to Buzz . . . I hesitated to think.
"I think we have everything covered," supposed Breaux.
"Sheriff, with all due respect and admiration for your years of experience, I want better than an ‘I think so’ from you. It’s my posterior on the line inside that building. Buzz and Boo will cover theirs outside until they might gain entry from below. Here’s my thought. I’m an official representative of Iberia Parish, right? As such I don’t want legalities to hamper my duties. Nor do I want to get in there and not know what’s happening. What sort of backup can we expect? What if all hell breaks loose? The thought just occurred to me that if it did, every decent witness available to the Task Force would be useless, and dead makes someone virtually useless," I stammered at the small-assembled group.
